Galup in the Spotlight for NAIDOC Week is a PerthNow feature about a place-based arts project sharing Noongar history connected to Galup (Lake Monger), in Perth. Its central work is a virtual-reality film created by Noongar theatre-maker Ian Wilkes and artist-filmmaker Poppy van Oorde-Grainger, shaped by Elder Doolann-Leisha Eatts’s oral history. The film was presented at WA Museum Boola Bardip during NAIDOC Week in July 2022; that museum engagement has ended.
What is the Galup project?
The Galup Arts Project brings together a site-specific performance and a virtual-reality film. Both make the lake and its surrounding Country central to the story, rather than treating the location as a backdrop. Project creator Same Drum describes the VR work as combining immersive imagery with oral history to explore colonialism’s continuing effects and the possibilities of connection and healing: Same Drum’s Galup Arts Project page.
The film grew out of a lakeside performance at the 2021 Perth Festival. The Town of Cambridge says the work was guided by Noongar Elders. Its creators are Wilkes, a Noongar theatre-maker, and van Oorde-Grainger, an artist and filmmaker; the oral history is voiced by Elder Doolann-Leisha Eatts, also called Nan Doolann in the PerthNow feature.
What happened at Lake Monger in 1830?
The project’s oral-history account concerns a massacre of Noongar people at the lake in 1830. PerthNow’s 2022 feature dates it to May 3 and reports that 30 people were killed. That figure and date should be understood as details reported in the article’s account of the oral history, not as an uncontested count independently resolved by the sources cited here. In 2024, the Town of Cambridge documented a community gathering at the site to acknowledge the 1830 massacre: Town of Cambridge report on the gathering.
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PerthNow’s account of the project’s development foregrounds Eatts and her family’s knowledge: it reports that her family’s account guided the creators and that she wanted to perform and share the story. The film is therefore best understood as a work shaped by named Noongar knowledge holders, not as a documentary that by itself settles every historical question. The City of Vincent study guide encourages learning about First Nations knowledge, cultures and histories from First Nations people: City of Vincent First Nations resources.
What does Galup mean?
Galup is identified in project and local-government materials with Lake Monger, a lake and reserve in Perth. The City of Vincent study guide gives “place of fire” as a Noongar-language gloss. Same Drum describes restoring the lake’s Whadjuk Noongar name as one of the project’s aims.
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This naming context does not mean the lake has been officially renamed. In 2024, the Town of Cambridge reported that it was consulting Whadjuk Traditional Owners on the Lake Monger (Galup) Management Plan 2024–34. The materials cited here do not establish that a formal name change has been completed.
What is the experience like?
The film places viewers in a headset-based, immersive view of the lake while Eatts’s voice carries the oral history. PerthNow described the experience as intimate and closely connected to place. Wilkes explained the project’s relationship to Country in a line quoted by the feature: “This lake is very powerful and this story is told by the animals, the land and the people — we’re all here together.”
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The original museum presentation ran at WA Museum Boola Bardip from July 3 to 17, 2022, during NAIDOC Week. It followed the 2021 Perth Festival lakeside performance, but it is not a current museum event listing. The Town of Cambridge’s event description for the 2022 presentation records those dates.
Where can you watch the Galup VR Experience?
There are two routes listed in project and local-library information, but availability should be confirmed directly before making plans:
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- Ask about a group screening: Same Drum lists inquiries for schools, events and organisations on its Galup Arts Project page.
- Ask about local viewing: The City of Vincent Local History Centre lists access to the film, described by the library as nine minutes long, on its Galup VR Experience page. Check with the centre about current viewing arrangements before travelling.
Murdoch University also listed a one-day Galup VR event for May 25, 2026. That dated presentation demonstrates a later institutional screening, not a continuing schedule. The viewing options listed by the project and library do not establish that a visitor needs to buy a headset.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.How the performance and film differ
| Format | Setting and medium | Access information |
|---|---|---|
| Site-specific performance | Performed on Country beside the lake; developed for the 2021 Perth Festival. | The cited materials describe the earlier performance and do not establish a current schedule. |
| VR film | A headset-based immersive film combining lake imagery and Eatts’s oral history. | Local viewing and arranged screenings are listed by the City of Vincent and Same Drum; confirm current availability directly. |
Why the story is framed as an “invisible truth”
The project brings attention to a history that can be obscured when a familiar public place is seen only as a recreational landscape. Its approach connects oral history, performance and immersive film to the place itself, while keeping Noongar voices and knowledge at the centre. Wilkes also describes the possibility of healing without denying what happened: “My dad Ted said just because something bad happened here doesn’t make it a bad place, but we need to share this history so it can be a place of healing.”
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